Updated ,first published
Washington: The United States has launched strikes against Iran for the second consecutive night as the ceasefire and tentative peace deal continues to fray following renewed Iranian aggression in the Strait of Hormuz.
“At the direction of the Commander in Chief, US Central Command forces have started conducting additional strikes against Iran to further degrade their ability to threaten freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz,” the US military said.
“The United States is holding Iran accountable for recent unjustified aggression against commercial shipping and civilian crews freely navigating a vital international waterway.”
The exact targets of the strikes late on Wednesday night (Tehran time) were not immediately clear, but they followed strikes the previous night against Iranian air defence systems, missile stocks, surveillance systems and drone launch sites.
The US and the Gulf states accused Iran of attacking three ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz, including a Qatari liquefied natural gas tanker and a Saudi Arabia-flagged crude oil tanker. Iran denied responsibility.
But after the initial US response, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it had attacked US bases in Kuwait and Bahrain.
The renewed violence represents the biggest threat to an already-fragile ceasefire since the Memorandum of Understanding was signed between the US and Iran in mid-June.
US President Donald Trump, speaking at the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey foreshadowed more strikes against Iran were likely in the wake Iran’s aggression.
“We knocked out 28 boats last night, little ones,” Trump told reporters on the sidelines of a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
“Will we go [again] tonight? Normally, I wouldn’t tell you, but you know what? There’s not a thing they can do about it … so, the answer is ‘probably’. Because they deserve it.”
Trump added: “There may be a big attack, and it’ll knock out a lot of stuff. We don’t knock out nothing – we knock out a lot.”
The new strikes began shortly after Trump left Turkey to return to the US via the United Kingdom. Air Force One was airborne as the strikes started.
The US president also talked down the potential to strike a deal with Iran to properly end the war. “I’m not seeing it with them,” Trump said. “My whole life is deals, I don’t see it with them.”
The 14-point MoU signed in June was supposed to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, end the US naval blockade of Iranian ports and commence a 60-day negotiating period for a final deal, as well as continuing the ceasefire that began in April.
Trump said he was considering reimposing the blockade, and US Central Command posted a video on social media on Wednesday (US time) showing the massive armada and air fleet still patrolling the region’s waterways and skies.
More to come
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Michael Koziol is the North America correspondent for The Age and Sydney Morning Herald. He is a former Sydney editor, Sun-Herald deputy editor and a federal political reporter in Canberra.Connect via X or email.
